The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1887-01-03
FUTURE PROBATION.
A Paper Read BY Rev. T. a. Goodwin Before
the Methodist Preachers Meeting, Dec. "a.

pIoseo DOT conceded, ana then proceeds to de-
duce conclusions which are wholly without foun-
dation- As theological technic it may be toll
Grated IN the absence of better term, but moth
ing more. The question intended to be dis
cussed Is the probability or possibility of such a
change Of character after death as is often real
lied in life; whether the good may become bad
and the bad become good in the life beyond, for
the possibility of transition either way implies
ssibility of transition the other way; for,
If the bad may become good, the good may be-
come bad. But why call this probation!
which authorizes the naming of the phenomena
OF life probation. 1t has grown from the same
misapprehension of the ends Of life as that which
Fabricated the idea that
Lifes the time TO mortals given
To scape from hell and fly to Heaven
Life has nc such q purpose. Its ends are
higher, purer, nobler and more eodlike.
To honor God, to benefit mankind
do serve with lofty gifts the lowly needs
VI that poor race, for which the God man died
And do it all for love- o, this is life
Escaping hell is mere incident Of a we'll
spent life; escaping heaven is the only sure con-
sequent. The Bible gives not single instance
OF an appeal TO the terrors of hell as motive to
cease TO do evil, except that the rich man in hell
but the suggestion was probably rejected as not
being the proper method to move sinners to a
oe tier lite. The rest and joy of heaven are
often set forth AS encouragement to endurance
In In tne ways OF righteousness, but nothing more.
Moses endured, having respect to the recompense
OF the reward. Paul kept the crown in sight to
strengthen him, and Christ himself endured for
the JOY that was set before Him.
Ihe dIfhculty in the popular eschatology of
to-day is that the church has not fully returned
to the Bible doctrine of last things from the fabri
cations of priestly ingenuity as developed in the
age OF monastic supremacy Then the priests
and Of hsa1sn because on the ,s.r. border
money in praying souls out 1 Of it. was was
retain the intermediate state which has no ex-
istence In the Bible. and which is utterly mean
lngiess where disconnected with the idea of
reformation; and the discussion which has lately
oeen folsted on the church, relating to the posi-
bil1ty of change of moral character after
death, has grown entirely out of tho inconsist
ency OF Protestant creeds on this subject to.
gether with its companion Pigment that this life
is probation; that the great purpose of living
here is to prepare for the hereafter, because nu-
man life On earth sustains to the life beyond the
relation that a novice in convent
sustains to the monk after having com
pleted the period of probation in the
hard school OF convent life. There the
master constantly impressed his novice with the
immense value of penance and prayers as so Sc
curing higher rank in the monastc life that thew
were TO De coveted, just as the poet perverts
Scripture when he sings:
Our sufferings and our trials here
Shall only make richer there
When we arrive at home.
Lille here is not probation. It is only sec
ton of our eternal living differing from the life
beyond. so far as we can see or know. only in
Its material environments Here we live in an
earthly house. as best suited to earthly sur
roundines; there, it doth not yet appear what
we shall be, except that our heavenly house will
be building of God, not made with hands
ana IL shall be imperishable. In every
sense, that is an unexpiored country It NAV
not be true that none have ever returned from
Its bourn, but it is true that the languape Of
earth has utterly failed to convey to us any sat
istactory notion Of its realities The average no
tlon Is purely materialistc. To the Indian
heaven is happy hunting ground, while to the
Christian 1t is anything the poets have painted
Watts makes it beautiful landscape while
John describes it as q great city with rearly
gates, and jasper walls. and golden streets;
while the hell of the poets is a pit without bot,
tom, filled with burning birthstone. and harpies.
and hends, and instruments of torture
The monks of the middle ages
had these conceptions we'll elaborated
and it is wholly because some yet remain who
cling to the gross materialism Of the dark aces
that this question of the possibility of & change
OF moral character-and, therefore, change Of
place--after death, is matter of discussion
Within half century the burning lake has been
sions OF future punishments Why should not a
specific place also be eliminated Why shonld
heaven be a walled city. out of which the ran
somed may not 60, and hell bottomless prison
sion seemSto relate wholly to the possibility Of
an escape from hell, those who indulge in II as.
Stunning that. in heaven. they are forever safe
In this discussion We must accept the Bible as
supreme authority, but we must apply its
teachings with enlightened discretion The
papists prove transubstantiation by the Bible
while We find abundant reasons for not accentino
their deductions without dscreditlng their an |
lhority By Calvin the horrible decreesp were |
defended from the Bible: but there ara vary fo1r
now who accept his deductions. though tasv
reverence the book which, to his mind tanoht |
mat dogma Fifty years ago, and even later
ne papal doctrine of burning hell found |
Protestant defenders who could quote Scripture |
never preached by intelligent men.
ret the Bible was never more rever,
.nced as Gods word than now, 90 that having
he idea OF the unalierable moral character Of |
D the application of Scripture in proving it. for
here is not passage quoted in its defense that
VIII not gracefully yield to another view
AS matter of fact. the Bible is absolutely 81
ent on this subject, AS if it would say that it's
mission Is to deal only with the living present
)nly one truth stands pre-eminent which re-
ates to the life to come and to that life only as
hat life is continuation of the life that now
;. whatsoever man soweth that shall
70 also reap" is Gods universal truth
nd any theory relating to matter or to morals
hat does not recognize this as unchanreabla
radically defective Heaven and hell are as
lainly taught in the Bible al to the future a.
oy and sorrow are taught as the present a.
uences OF virtue and vice. But we are left
7holly to conjecture and analogy in our concep-
Ions of the permanency of either
Let US see 1t is the soul that sins not the
ody. The soul is the man, the body is merely
ne Temporary house; the earthly house AZ
'aui calls it; the tabernacle" or .tent.v as
eter calls it, in which the man sojourns little
lille Matter. by being incorporated in this
hough flesh, for Isaiah understood the
Philosophy of animated matter when
Q said. "All flesh is grass" Grass can
o more sin after having been
into human flesh than when
into the flesh of anv other an;m.I